SanDisk's New Fuze: iPod Features, Shuffle Price

SanDisk on Tuesday unveiled its newest flash-based MP3 player, the Sansa Fuze, which looks and acts a lot like the latest iPods. But it's priced like a Shuffle.

SanDisk unveiled today its newest flash-based MP3 player, the Sansa Fuze. Set to be released early next month, the player is available in 2GB, 4GB, and 8GB capacities, with prices starting at $79.99. The Fuze features an FM radio, microSD card slot, voice recorder, and 1.9-inch color screen that can play videos in landscape mode.

The Fuze is can be used with such music subscription services as Rhapsody To Go, Napster, and eMusic, and supports MP3, WAV, Audible, WMA, MPEG-4, JPEG file types. The player is compatible with the XP, Vista, Mac, and Linux OSes (the latter two under MSC mode). According to Sandisk, the device's rechargeable battery should give you up to 24 hours of audio and five hours of video playback.

Set for release in April, the Fuze will run $79.99, $99.99, and $129.99 for the 2GB, 4GB, and 8GB models, respectively. The 2GB model is available in black; 4GB in black, red, pink, or blue; and 8GB in silver.

Customers in Europe and Canada will be able to pick up the player later this spring.

Poised to take on the iPod nano, the Fuze improves on Apple's player by dropping the price and adding a microSD slot for memory and the usual slew of non-iPod features including an FM tuner and voice recorder. The Sandisk rep we spoke with also hinted that, while the MSRPs for the devices are set, the company likes to strike deals with retailers, so finding them for even cheaper shouldn't be an issue.

The Fuze joins Sandisk existing line of Sansa players, including the video-centric View and the Click, which offers competition for Apple's low-end Shuffle.

Brian Heater has worked at a number of tech pubs, including Engadget, Laptop, and PCMag (where he served as Senior Editor). Most recently, he was as the Managing Editor of TechTimes.com. His writing has appeared in Spin, Wired, Playboy, Entertainment Weekly, The Onion, Boing Boing, Publishers Weekly, The Daily Beast and various other publications. He hosts the weekly Boing Boing interview podcast RiYL, has appeared as a regular NPR contributor and shares his Queens apartment with a rabbit named Lucy.
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